When you've got a potential customer on the hook, you need to act immediately. That's what prompted call-automation technology company TuVox to invest in a new site-visitor tracking service two years ago.

The service it uses from VisiStat allows the TuVox sales team to view visitor activity on its website in real time, rather than having to comb through log reports 24 hours later for nuggets of information. It alerts users to activity by sending out an e-mail whenever someone visits designated pages--sort of like the bell ringing on the front door of a retail establishment.

Using VisiStat, the TuVox sales team has doubled the number of appointments it has been able to make with website visitors, says Steve Pollock, 45, co-founder and executive vice president of TuVox. "Before that, the sales team had no idea which leads to prioritize and who to call. Now they're not wasting their time."

In addition, by associating certain e-mail marketing campaign messages with unique web landing pages, TuVox's team can tell exactly who is taking a peek at its information, further refining the sales prospecting process. In all, 13 people from the Cupertino, California-based company can view the website traffic reports. "As an executive, I feel very comfortable looking at this information," says Pollock. "I can also see that it has even more value for my people."

TuVox, which generates about $20 million in annual sales, currently pays between $300 and $400 per year for the VisiStat service, compared with the several thousands of dollars per year it previously spent on its website analytics service.

The service starts at $29.95 per month, $69.95 per quarter or $270 per year for small and midsize businesses. That gets your business 24/7 access to the information and up to 25,000 page views analyzed. As your website traffic goes up, so will your fees.

Heather Clancy, a freelance journalist and consultant, has been covering the high-tech industry for close to 20 years. She can be reached at hccollins@mac.com.